Bow-Arm Morris Chair

Video Workshop Series

Build a Bow-Arm Morris Chair

with Gregory Paolini

Paolini began woodworking in high school and found that he had an affinity for the Arts and Crafts style.

Gregory PaoliniWaynesville, North Carolina

Originally from Buffalo, N.Y., he and his wife moved in 2006 to a small town near Asheville, N.C. Paolini builds custom furniture, is a frequent contributor to Fine Woodworking, and a blogger for the Woodworking Life.

In this video workshop, he'll show you step-by-step how to make a this comfortable Arts and Crafts recliner. For the most part, the construction is straightforward. But the most distinctive part of the chair--its bow arms--presents two big challenges: making a curved lamination, and cutting a mortise-and-tenon joint on the curved arms and side frame.

He'll show how laminating the arms gets you around those challenges. And he'll also demonstrate how to get striking quartersawn grain everywhere it counts, including a simple and authentic method for making a leg with four quartersawn faces.

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